Paul Revere

(1734-1818)

BIRTH

December 21, 1734

PLACE

Boston, Massachusetts

DEATH

May 10, 1818

PLACE

Boston, Massachusetts

FAMILY

FATHER

Apollos Rivoire

(1702–1754)

WIFE

Sarah Orne Revere

(1736-1773)

WIFE

Rachel Walker Revere

(1745-1813)

HOMES

Paul Revere House

MA - Boston, Massachusetts, USA

RELIGIOUS VIEWS

CHRISTIAN

CONGREGATIONALIST

MEMBERSHIPS

FREEMASON, MASSACHUSETTS CHARITABLE MECHANIC ASSOCIATION FOUNDER, MASSACHUSETTS CHARITABLE MECHANIC ASSOCIATION PRESIDENT, MASSACHUSETTS GRAND LODGE GRAND MASTER, RISING STATES LODGE FOUNDER, SONS OF LIBERTY MEMBER, ST ANDREW'S LODGE BOSTON MASTER, ST ANDREW'S LODGE BOSTON MEMBER

AWARDS

Paul Revere (1734–1818) was a Boston silversmith, engraver and Patriot courier whose April 1775 ride warned of approaching British troops. His political prints helped spread resistance, and he later served in the Massachusetts militia. After the Revolution he built a foundry casting bells and cannon, then opened a copper rolling mill in 1801. Its sheets covered the Massachusetts State House dome and the hull of USS Constitution. He also led artisan and civic organizations.

BUSINESSPERSONRIDERSOLDIERSTATESMAN

EARLY LIFE

Revere's father died in 1754, when Paul was legally too young to officially be the master of the family silver shop. In February 1756, during the French and Indian War (the North American theater of the Seven Years' War), he enlisted in the provincial army. Possibly he made this decision because of the weak economy, since army service promised consistent pay. Commissioned a second lieutenant in a provincial artillery regiment, he spent the summer at Fort William Henry at the southern end of Lake George in New York as part of an abortive plan for the capture of Fort St. Frédéric. He did not stay long in the army, but returned to Boston and assumed control of the silver shop in his own name.

Paul Revere established a Boston silversmith's business that provided the foundation of his working life. The shop produced household silver, ornaments, and other commissioned pieces through the labor of Revere, apprentices, and journeymen. He supplemented its income with engraving and other services. Political prints, including his version of the Boston Massacre scene in 1770, placed his craft within the colonial protest movement. The famous engraving was propaganda rather than a neutral visual record and drew on Henry Pelham's design.

Revere participated in Patriot networks as an organizer and courier. On April 18, 1775, Joseph Warren sent him to warn John Hancock and Samuel Adams at Lexington of the approaching British troops. The alarm depended on a network of riders and local messengers, including William Dawes and Samuel Prescott. Revere was detained before reaching Concord. His role was important, but the later image of a solitary rider saving the countryside simplified the collective effort and the actual route of his journey.

During the Revolutionary War, Revere printed currency and helped obtain military supplies. He served as a lieutenant colonel in Massachusetts artillery and commanded at Castle Island. In 1779 he took part in the failed Penobscot expedition against the British post at Castine. The collapse of the operation led to accusations about his conduct. After repeatedly requesting a formal hearing, he faced a court-martial in 1782 and was acquitted. His military service was therefore more troubled than the later celebration of his ride might suggest.

After the war Revere expanded into a hardware business and a foundry, while his son assumed greater responsibility for the silver shop. The foundry supplied shipbuilding fittings, cast bells, and produced cannon. In 1801 he established a copper rolling mill at Canton, Massachusetts, developing a successful domestic source of sheet copper. Its products were used on the Massachusetts State House dome and in the recoppering of USS Constitution.

Revere retired from business in 1811 and died in 1818. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem, published decades later, made his ride a national legend while changing or omitting important details. His actual career joined skilled manufacturing, political communication, military service, and industrial enterprise. The businesses and objects he left behind document accomplishments extending well beyond the single night for which he became best known.

CAREER

DEATH

Revere remained politically active throughout his life. His business plans in the late 1780s were often stymied by a shortage of adequate money in circulation. Alexander Hamilton's national policies regarding banks and industrialization exactly matched his dreams, and he became an ardent Federalist committed to building a robust economy and a powerful nation. Of particular interest to Revere was the question of protective tariffs; he and his son sent a petition to Congress in 1808 asking for protection for his sheet copper business. He continued to participate in local discussions of political issues even after his retirement in 1811, and in 1814 circulated a petition offering the government the services of Boston's artisans in protecting Boston during the War of 1812. Revere died on May 10, 1818, at the age of 83, at his home on Charter Street in Boston. He is buried in the Granary Burying Ground on Tremont Street. Revere's final years were spent in Boston after he had largely withdrawn from the industrial enterprises that occupied much of his post-Revolutionary life. He had outlived his wife Rachel, who died in 1813, and several of his children. Those bereavements belong to the background of his old age, not proof of a cause of death. The biography records his death on May 10, 1818, without a detailed terminal medical account. His burial in the Granary Burying Ground placed him among other figures associated with the Revolution, while the later fame of the midnight ride developed well after his own lifetime.

Grave of Paul Revere

Beacon Street, Boston, Massachusetts, 02133, USA